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We started Medestino travel blog because we love to travel. When we travel, we are constantly amazed and inspired by the people we meet, the cultures we're exposed to, and the adventures we have. We want to share our discoveries with you and allow you to share yours with us. The result will be a community of travelers, adventurers, and vacationers connected by their thirst for the unknown.
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It’s sometimes easy to forget how vast the world is and how many interesting people are out there doing amazing things. Getting caught up in the day-to-day routine can make the world feel small and uninteresting. We want to inspire you, give you the opportunity to share your story, meet people who love the things that you love and give you the tools to plan new adventures.
So go get started! Discover over and over again how lucky you are to be on this planet and how much there is to explore. Whether you're taking a year off, or just those precious two weeks…the world is at your fingertips. Think of Medestino as a global watering hole for creativity, culture, and adventures big and small. In the end, Medestino will be what you make it.
Optimism without ignorance, confidence without arrogance, engagement without aggression – Medestino offers a truly authentic connection to the world around you. We urge you find your destination here with us. We urge you to meet your destiny. Welcome to Medestino travel blog.
If you're one of the most influential celebrities in the world, you have more than a few options when it comes to traveling.
Like the rest of us, some A-listers have a tried-and-true vacation spot, while others prefer to explore new parts of the world every chance they get. The upside to having a mansion at your disposal in Maui – like Oprah – is that the entire place has been outfitted to accommodate your personal needs. Every time you visit, it takes less time to settle in and relax.
World-weary Brad Pitt and Angelina are known to travel en masse and take over multiple suites in a hotel with their children, caretakers and, currently, a full medical staff. They bring so many people and belongings, in fact, that they're sure to feel at home wherever they land their private plane.
When Angelina was visiting the troops in Iraq, Brad took six-year-old Maddox and four-year-old Pax skiing at California's Mammoth Mountain.
If your friends routinely earn upwards of $30 million every year, it's no easy feat to find interesting birthday gifts. When Victoria Beckham, the former Spice Girl and wife of soccer god David Beckham, turned 34 in April, 2008, he turned to top pal Tom Cruise for help. What did Tom, and his wife Katie Holmes, wrap up for the woman once known as Posh Spice? A private trip to Napa Valley.
Since Johnny Depp and partner Vanessa Paradis live permanently in the south of France – where many stars have their vacation homes – their second home had to top the French villa.
In 2004, Depp bought Little Hall's Pond Cay, a 35-acre island in the Bahamas. Though plans for the private island have not been revealed, other single-island resorts like Richard Branson's Necker Island in the British Virgin Isles and Nicholas Cage's Leaf Cay in the Bahamas may provide inspiration.
Whether your ideal vacation getaway is a private island in a sun-soaked sea, or a simple day on the slopes, there's an A-list celebrity who shares your taste. Even if you're unlikely to be summoned by Jay-Z for a private soiree on the French Riviera, you can always pretend. All you need is $30 million or so in the bank.
British musician Sting with his band The Police this summer held successful concert at Usce in Belgrade for 30.000 fans.
Sting, the professional name of British rock musician Gordon Sumner, on February 8, 2009 will hold its third concert in Belgrade in the Arena as the guest of Guitar Art Festival. Also the Italian composer of film music Ennio Morricone will perform at the festival.
British rock star appeared for the first time before the Serbian public in 2006 in Petrovaradin Fortress, Novi Sad and held soloist concert.
In support of the critically-acclaimed album, 'Songs From the Labyrinth', Sting and Edin Karamazov will perform a concert on February 8th in Belgrade at the Guitar & Arts Festival. Tickets will go on sale from December 15 from www.gaf.rs.
Confirmed dates for 2009 are now:
08 Feb 2009 Sava Centre, Belgrade, Serbia
10 Feb 2009 Palatului Hall, Bucharest, Romania (with Stile Antico)
11 Feb 2009 Vatroslav Lisinski, Zagreb, Croatia (with Stile Antico)
OahuIsland lost power during US President-elect Barrack Obama's visit there. President Obama and his family spent holidays there before his inauguration that took place on 20 January.
President Obama was accompanied by his seven-year-old daughter Malia and 10-year-old Sasha, as well as with friends when the blackout took place. Dozens of secret services men prevented the people from taking pictures of the new US president, while dining at a restaurant.
"The fact that this is the place he chooses to come to spend the holidays is a nice touch," says David Uchiyama, vice president of marketing for the state Tourism Authority. "Having him here and him keeping his ties to Hawaii certainly helps us. Hawaii gets the spotlight for a period here where a lot of the country is blanketed in snow."
Corfu’s splendid natural vistas did not go unnoticed by film producers. In fact, Corfu has figured prominently in high profile and blockbuster movies. Mention must be made of the hit 1981 James Bond movie- For Your Eyes Only. This particular film immortalized Corfu’s rich historical past viz-a-viz the scene depicting an underwater ancient Greek temple wherin a huge turtle is seen moving about in front.
The film’s high profile Casino scene too was shot at Corfu’s renowned landmark Achillion Palace. Additional scenes from the same film were shot in Corfu. For instance, the romantic walk that Melina and James undertake through the town’s colorful streets and the scene of Melina being greeted by who else ! but Bond on the island of Pontikonisi has catpulted Corfu in the big time world movie landscape. The colorful scene of the traditional Greek Wedding too was shot at the picturesque Bouas-Danilia Village.
Ever since Corfu carved out a niche for itself as an ideal destination for shooting films post “For Your Eyes Only”, it was the turn of the BBC to shoot on this island. A Television serial and a movie which in fact was the adapted version of Gerald Durrell’s best selling book “My Family and Other Animals” that was primarily based on the author’s childhood spent in the island of Corfu in the decade of the thirties.
The island of Corfu welcomed Roger Moore as James Bond
Corfu has a lot to offer, from beautiful beaches to magnificent landscapes. For the Bond location hunter, it has even more to offer. In For Your Eyes Only it was used by the filmmakers not only as the island it is, but also as the area around Madrid (Spain) and Albania. Director John Glen wanted to return to the style of the earliest Connery films and present Bond as a more realistic hero who gets hurt every now and then. The storyline was roughly based on two short stories by Ian Fleming, “For your Eyes Only” and “Risico”. The script ultimately written by Michael Wilson and Richard Maibaum, For Your Eyes Only had a budget of 28 million Dollars and called for mainly European locations. Greece was soon decided upon, since it was a country Bond had not visited before. While scouting for possible locations, Michael Wilson and John Glen instantly fell in love with the island of Corfu, realizing its beauty had a lot of potential. Corfu Town is a busy place. In the heart of the city, a pedestrian area called ‘the Old Town’, is crowded with tourists all try to bring home some souvenirs from the many shops. Here you should take your time, sit down somewhere and relax a bit while enjoying a glass of Ouzo, the national drink. In this area you will also find the Agios Spyridon Tower, which could be briefly seen in the film, when Bond and Melina ‘shopping’. A big park on the eastern side of the city is called the Spianada. Here the Greeks play… cricket (!), a sport introduced by the British around 1850. In the park, you can also briefly visible in the film.
One of the most exciting Bond locations in Corfu Town is undoubtedly The Old Fortress, built by the Venetians. This fortress served in fact as a background for more than one action sequence. It is already visible in the beginning of the film, when Gonzales flies Melina towards her parent’s boat. Later in the film, it is supposed to be close to Kristatos’ Albanian warehouse. This ‘warehouse’ is located on the northern side of the fortress, and is in reality a small harbour house. When Bond and Colombo’s men arrive at the warehouse at night, they come from the north.
Time to enter the fortress. The admission fee is only 5 Euro. When you walk into the recently restored area, you will not immediately be reminded of the exciting scenes in which Bond follows Locque on foot. But if you know where to look for, you can find all locations! To avoid unnecessary and time consuming searching, the best thing to do is to go to the left when you are in front of the ‘British barracks’. Following this path will lead you through the tunnels in which Bond was almost ran over by Locque’s Mercedes. There are in fact only two of these tunnels inside the fortress, and again this shows how clever filmmakers can be. It is amazing to see, that they ingeniously used every remarkable spot inside the fortress, and made it look like one big car-foot chase.
The road and tunnels eventually lead to the most eastern side of the fortress, an area where not many tourists show up, fortunately. Here you will find the still very recognisable stone gate from where Bond finally shoots Locque. In the film, Bond appears from the right side of the gate. In reality there is only a very small space here, mostly filled with rubble. Again this space was very cleverly used. After Locque is shot by Bond, the former’s car spins and crashes into a low brick wall. We all remember Locque’s car standing on the edge of a high cliff. This cliff is in fact not in front of the stone gate, but behind it. A security rope prevents us from falling down, but not from stepping over it to take some great photos of this very recognisable cliff… Although in this scene Roger Moore finally brought back something of Bond’s original harshness, he reportedly had big difficulty playing this. In the scene, Bond avenges his murdered Italian contact Ferrara, by showing killer Locque no mercy and finally kicking the latters car off the cliff. This kind of ruthlessness had in fact not been seen since the earlier Bond films. Recently, access to this area has been restricted, but there’s always the possibilty to climb some fences on the south side, or climb some walls and hills on the north side to get to your destination. Be careful though, the area hasn’t been taken care of for a while and is not in a very good state. The island of Corfu: Kanoni
Only a stone’s throw away from Corfu Town lies the crowded Kanoni peninsula. Once the most beautiful corner of the island, it attracted too many tourists, and now it is almost completely filled with hotels. A small one-way street leaves from the most southern part of Corfu Town’s boulevard and takes you up the hill to some marvellous views. Just follow the road and the signs to Vlacherna and Pondikonissi, better known as ‘Mouse Island’. You will end up at the monastery of Vlacherna. This little church is on almost every postcard and is the most famous site in Corfu.
Here, on the concrete road towards the monastery, Melina arrived by boat, after the action in Cortina d’Ampezzo. Driving back, up the hill, this time taking a sharp turn to the right, you will head towards a great viewing point. Here you have a marvellous view of the monastery and ‘Mouse Island’ in the background. To your right you can see the lagoon of Corfu Town, with the runway of Corfu Airport. It’s hard to imagine why so many hotels offer a room-with-a-view of this dirty lagoon. Following the road up the hill, you will pass the entrance of the Corfu Palace Hotel, where you can find the casino nowadays. Time to slow down. Immediately past the Corfu Palace entrance, also on your right, you will find a metal fence. Next to it is a name plate: Villa Sylva, one of the most hard to find Bond locations. If you’re lucky, the gate is wide open and it is totally up to you whether you want to ignore the sign “Beware of the dogs” or drive on. I can tell you, it is worth to take a look inside. Driving through the gate, you will find yourself on a bad road, but don’t let this scare you off. Follow the road past a small house on your left, until you enter a small roundabout. In the middle of this roundabout there’s a statue of a dog. Is this the dog you were supposed to beware of?
Park your car somewhere and walk towards the house. Does it already look familiar? When you see the pool, you must finally realize that you have found the ‘Spanish’ villa of hired hitman Gonzales. Here the memorable scenes were filmed wherein ‘Bond had Gonzales perforated by Miss Havelock’. Things have changed a bit around here, but people with a good memory can still recognise the pool area, the diving board, the outside bar and the garden area around the house. If the place is still as abandoned as it was when we got there, take your time for a small walk through the garden and discover some beautiful views. Not a bad place for a villa, right?
Villa Sylva was also used in the film The Executioner, starring George Peppard and Joan Collins, in 1970. Situated next to "Mon Repos", the summer home of the King of Greece and the birthplace of Prince Philip of Great Britain, the villa can be rented if you’re interested through Villagetaways.com. During the high season, the villa rents for just 26,000 Dollars a week. This might give you a clue of the luxury and magnificent views you can expect inside.
The island of Corfu: The north
When you leave Kanoni and Corfu Town and head towards the north, you will pass some very touristic towns, like Gouvia and Dassia. At Gouvia, a few kilometres more inland, lies Danilia Village, a specially prepared village that served as some sort of open air museum. Mainly due to financial problems, the village was closed, and is not accessible for us anymore. This keeps us from visiting the church where Bond met Q, who informs him about the amount of ‘St.Cyrils’ he had discovered in Greece. This scene, as well as the Greek wedding scene, was filmed in Danilia Village. A very funny sign at the entrance gate tells us it will re-open in 200.. The last number has been removed and visitors have taken this opportunity to fill in the gap and leave comments like "September 2004, still not open!"
The stone entrance gate to the village was also used as the gate around Gonzales’ Spanish countryside villa. On the road in front of it, we saw Bond drive his Lotus while passing Locque in his Mercedes. The latter can then be seen turning into the gate and driving on to the premises. Although the area in front of the gate has clearly been altered by mother nature in the past years (trees now almost hide the complete entrance), it is still not hard to recognize the location.
If you keep following the coastal road, driving through Ipsos and Pyrgi, you will also get to Kalami Bay, where marine archeologist Sir Timothy Havelock and his wife were stationed by the British to try to recover the ATAC computer. Here, Melina was dropped off by Hector Gonzales, after which he takes off, flies away and turns his plane around to assasinate the Havelocks. Below, on the right side of the bay, you might be able to see the square white house where writer and poet Lawrence Durrell lived in the ’30’s. Now known as the ‘white house’, Durrell called it Prospero, and it was in this house he wrote his most famous work ‘Prospero’s Cell’. For those interested in staying at historical places, the owner rents the house for a thousand Euros per week.
When you return from Kalami, following the road back to the busy tourist towns, try to find the exit on the right towards Spartilas. On this small corner, you can probably recognise the place where Bond stopped his Lotus to look at his road map, while searching for Gonzales’ villa. Following the road up the hill brings you to an awesome view of Corfu’s east coast. And eventhough you might think the sharp curved road was used in the 2CV chase, this is not the case. These roads will be our next stop.
You will find yourself on a maze of roads, and sometimes there aren’t even any road signs. Best fun you will have at the crossings, where you can always find a couple of people desperately trying to figure out which way to go. As it turns out, most of the time the necessary direction signs are behind some bushes or even a few meters behind the actual crossing! At Kastellani, start following the signs towards Agios Georgios Beach. This is the road used in the 2CV car chase scenes.During their location scouting on Corfu, the film makers noticed the local farmers collecting the olives from the trees, which inspired them to incorporate the winding roads and cascading olives in the car chase. Often, ideas like these are written into the script at the last minute and sometimes whole scenes are changed by coincidental encounters with local habits.
Before we get to one of the most interesting locations on the island, we approach a tiny town called Vatonies. The last curve before town, recognisable from a stone bridge, was used in the first scene after we see Bond leave Moneypenny’s office. Bond drives his Lotus through the (Spanish) countryside and we see him excellerate in to the hills. Two Cypress trees, visible in the film as tiny trees, are still recognisable here in front of the bridge, now 25 years later.
Directly after passing Vatonies, you will enter the town of Pagi. Pagi can easily be called the smallest and least interesting town on the island. Except for us! Pagi overwhelms you when you look at the town more carefully. In this town, Bond and Melina’s yellow Citroen 2CV had its finest hour and raced some mean looking baddies in Peugeots. The roads surrounding Pagi, whirl themselves through the immense fields of olive trees and were also used in that same car chase, brilliantly staged by French stunt co-ordinator Remi Julienne. He would later also work on scenes like the May Day chase around the Eiffel Tower in ‘A View To A Kill’. Filming started on Wednesday September 24th 1980 and took nearly 12 days, using a total of 5 Citroens or the various scenes
The main road through Pagi leads you past some recognisable landmarks, like the town’s church tower. In the heart of the village, you will immediately recognise the famous place where Bond advised Melina to ‘take the low road’, after which the 2CV ended up on it’s roof. Nothing has changed a bit since those days, and it seems as if time has stood still in Pagi. Best thing to do, is to park your car somewhere and stroll around this lovely and quiet place. I can assure you that images of a yellow 2CV will keep on bothering your retina… From Pagi it is only a few kilometres to Agios Georgios, where you can spend some time on the beach. The town itself is filled with hotels, so this could be a good opportunity to relax and perhaps even spend the night.
The Island of Corfu: The Achilleion
Our next goal is to visit the palace of Empress Elisabeth of Austria, better known to the world as ‘Sissi’. Impressed by the beautiful view, she bought the land in 1890 and ordered the construction of her palace ‘Achilleion’, where she was to spend many springs and autumns. In the early 60’s, the Greek government rented the palace to a German consortium, who totally refurbished and remodelled the top floors, and turned them into the island’s first and only casino. It was here where the casino scene in For Your Eyes Only was filmed.
From Corfu Town, you should drive to the south, towards Gastouri and Benitses. The palace is mentioned on the road signs immediately after you pass Corfu Town’s outer areas. Just follow the signs, and you will be taken up a hill, straight to the Achilleion. The admission fee for the palace is about 3 Euro. When you walk through the entrance gate, you will see what many believe is one of the ugliest mixtures of architectural styles. Whether you like it or not, of course, is purely a matter taste, but it sure brings back some memories. The entrance of the building was briefly visible in the casino scene. On the eastern side of the building, you will find a beautiful square, paved with black and white stones. Here Bond had a delicious diner with Kristatos, while observing Colombo and Countess Lisl. Walking northwards you will get one of the best views on the island. A serene balcony terrace offers an absolutely marvellous view of Corfu Town and of Albania and the Greek mainland on the other side of the sea strip. Here, later in the film, Bond and Melina share a romantic moment together, Melina relating how much ‘her father loved this view’. In fact, this view and the gardens surrounding the palace make it very worth while to visit the palace. Take your time.
The island of Corfu: The south
The southern part of Corfu differs from the rest, mainly because it is much flatter. Only in the most southern corner a small mountain rim is present, but most of the south is reasonably flat. A major touristic area you will find around Kavos. If you like going out to bars and discotheques, you should not forget to visit this town. Another interesting place is Lake Korission. This huge lake provides home to many interesting bird species. A small gap in the dunes leads directly to the Ionian Sea, and it is this gap that divides the area into two parts. The southern part of this area has only recently been discovered by the tourists, the main town there being Agios Georgios.
Although we have mentioned this name before, it is a totally different place Inthis southern Agios Georgios you will find excellent space for water sports and the beaches are hard to resist. When you walk on the beach, you should walk northwards, towards Lake Korission. Once you will notice the sandy dunes, you should take some time to look around. Doesn’t this area ring a bell somewhere?
Since this is the only place on the island where you will find dunes, it will not take very long for you to realise that here on these dunes Countess Lisl von Schlaf was murdered by Locque. In the film, Bond and the Countess spend the night together and early in the morning decide to go for a walk on the beach. When Locque appears in his dune-buggy, Lisl runs away and gets hit by the buggy. The actual bungalow where Bond and Lisl spent the night was just a fake facade, put there for the filming.You will understand there’s is not a trace left of it.
The Greek mainland: Meteora
When you’re looking for an interesting excursion, you should consider taking the ferry to the mainland. From Corfu Town, the ferry leaves every hour. You can either walk onboard (6 Euros) or take your rental car (27 Euros). The boat trip takes about 1,5 hours and will bring you to Igoumenitsa. From there, it’s a 200km ride to Meteora, mostly on small curved roads over some of the highest mountains of Greece. The ride takes about 3,5 hours, but if the newly constructed Ignatia Road is ready, your ride will be both much more comfortable and faster. At this point of writing, some parts have been opened, others are still on the drawing table. From Igoumenitsa, follow the road to Ioaninna and Metsovo and finally to Kalambaka. There, the real adventure begins the moment it is virtually impossible to miss the mysterious, huge cliffs at the horizon.
Still following the road signs ‘Meteora’, you will be taken through the small town of Kastraki and then immediately up to the mountains. After a lot of curves, you will discover a road sign bearing the names of all the monasteries in the Meteora region. Since EON used Agia Triada (or Agios Trias, the holy trinity) Monastery for the long shots of Kristatos’ hideout, called St.Cyrils in the film, best thing to do is follow the sign that leads to this beautiful site. The moment you see this monastery (or any other monastery you will come across) you will not believe your eyes! From the mountain rim you have a clear view on the valley, and in the middle of this unimaginable landscape stand these huge rocks, like pillars, each carrying a monastery on its top.
In 1334 the monk Athanasios came to this region destined to build a monastery. Together with fourteen other monks he climbed Platys Lithos, one of the rock formations. There he started building the first monastery, Megala Meteora and others were soon to follow.
The reason for building these holy monasteries on top of rocks, was to be closer to god. When the region was attacked by intruders from other countries, the monasteries seemed untakeable fortresses. Their location only became a disadvantage in more recent years, when Nazi bombers found the monasteries very easy targets, and did destroy some of them.
From the road to Agia Triada Monastery you have a beautiful view of the rock. This is definitely the right place to take some photographs! Remember to go there either early in the morning or late in the afternoon, because only then you will have the advantage of not being overran by busloads of tourists, who come in every day around 11.00h to get a quick view and leave around 16.00h to be back on time for their dinner.
From the entrance of the monastery it’s a small walk downhill, until you reach the path they cut out of the rock. Climbing up the stairs, you will have a great view of the base of the rock, the place where the Bond/Colombo party arrived and had a first look on ‘St.Cyrils’. Truth is, John Glen didn’t use much of the actual monastery, but had a more usable monastery-set built on the rock next to Agia Triada. This rock was also used for other close-ups, and is now not accessible for us. To enter a holy monastery requires proper clothing. Women are supposed to cover their legs and shoulders, and the monks have therefore all sorts of skirts and scarfs available. It sure makes great pictures!
During the filming at Meteora, the producers had a very hard time dealing with the Greek monks, as the latter were not too impressed by the violent image of the series main character. Despite the brilliant comment by Roger Moore, who told them politely that he ‘once was a saint himself’, the monks tried to sabotage the filming by hanging out their white laundry as a protest. After some negotiation, the film crew rapidly started working on the dangerous climbing scene, performed by Bond-veteran-stuntman Rick Sylvester, who earlier jumped the Asgard mountain in the pre-credit scene of The Spy Who Loved Me. The smart directing of the stunning climb, made sure that this scene is still being regarded as one of the series’ highlights.
After a small tour of the monastery, you can walk outside to the ‘garden’. You will then also pass the pull-up basket, the monks use to pull up all the items that are too heavy to walk up. Although situated in a similar wooden cabin, this is not the same cabin used in the film. EON reproduced a cabin at the studio for the filming of the sequence where Bond pulls in Colombo and Melina. Outside the monastery is a great look-out. A dazzling cliff without any fence offers a magnificent view of the villages below. It’s this same area where Bond throws away the ATAC, and calls it ‘detente, comrade’.
All in all, Greece is tremendously exciting. Whether you come for the Greek temples, history and culture, the sun, the night life or the beaches, you will not be disappointed by the splendour of this cradle of European civilisation. Greece has a lot to offer. The people are friendly and helpful, and are always willing to tell what they remember of the Bond filming. The filming locations are somewhat scattered across the mainland and Corfu, but touring them like we just described here, will definitely leave an indelible impression on you, and will make sure that you will return to Greece one day.
The Acropolis will this year have a museum fit for Greece’s greatest treasure, the Elgin Marbles
Anew museum will open in Athens later this year. No big deal, you might think. You’d be wrong. The NewAcropolisMuseum is not merely a dazzling piece of modernist architecture, but the latest gambit in a 200-year campaign for the return of the Elgin Marbles.
The museum, which has been 30 years in the planning and has cost the Greek government more than £100m, will at last provide a permanent home for the greatest treasures of the classical period, safe from the city’s corrosive, polluted air.
Built in the shadow of the Acropolis, it will display the sections of the marbles owned by Greece – alongside plaster copies of the “missing” sections that reside in the BritishMuseum.
Whether the trustees of the BritishMuseum will be persuaded to give up one of their biggest crowd-pullers, only time will tell.
But regardless of the outcome, the Greek authorities have created a world-class attraction, as I discovered recently on an exclusive tour with the museum’s curator, Professor Dimi-trios Pandermalis.
First, the history. In the early 19th century, the Parthenon was under attack by looters. Lord Elgin, the British ambassador, hired a team of workers to hack away at the monument, taking many of its finest sculptures and large chunks of the marble frieze that lined the inside rim. Elgin shipped the treasures back to England and then sold them to the BritishMuseum for £35,000.
Fast-forward to the late 20th century. The marbles remain divided. Scientists discover the pollution in Athens is eating into the fabric of the Parthenon. The original Acropolis museum, built in the late 19th century, is cluttered and poorly maintained. A new museum is planned.
It took 25 years of wrangling before an architect was chosen: the controversial, Swiss-born Bernard Tschumi. His high-tech angular design – all glass, concrete and marble – stands in bold contrast to the monuments on the Acropolis. It’s a huge two-fingered salute to traditionalists, as emphatically modern and pleasing as IM Pei’s Louvre Pyramid in Paris.
Problems began as soon as the first spadeful of earth was dug. Beneath the site, builders discovered the remains of a settlement dating from the 4th century BC. Before each foundation was laid, protracted negotiations took place between architects, engineers and archeologists.
The result, though, is astonishing. The three-storey building appears to float over the ground on concrete piles, while beneath it the entire 4,000 sq metre site has been preserved. As you approach the entrance, you look down through glass panels cut into the plaza floor to see more than 2,000 years of history below, including immaculate mosaics.
Once inside, you climb a glass-floored ramp lined with some of the 50,000 artefacts found during the dig. “There are lifts, but we want people to walk up to remind them of the walk to the top of the Acropolis hill,” said Pandermalis.
We then went into a vast gallery designed to house 120 sculptures from the Archaic period. Daylight flooded in through floor-to-ceiling windows and glass panels high above our heads.
“The light is so beautiful in here, and it changes with the time of day and the seasons,” said the professor, standing before a towering statue of a goddess. “Look at the texture, the detail, it’s so soft. You can’t get that with artificial light.” I admired the quality of the marble. “We spent a long time choosing it,” he said. “It comes from Helicon, the sacred mountain of the Muses.”
The sheer scale – 10 times the size of the original Acropolis museum, with 14,000 sq meters of floor space – means exhibits have room to breathe. Visitors can wander between the thick concrete columns to find fresh angles and perspectives. It feels more like a temple than an exhibition space.
Beautiful though it was, Pandermalis was clearly anxious to get me up to the top floor, a huge glass-walled gallery where the treasures of the Parthenon will be displayed. Even without any exhibits, this would be a stunning building, with panoramic views across the city.
Wrapped around the central core of the gallery at eye level is the 160-metre-long frieze, with the Greek originals – coated in a soft brown patina – standing alongside white-plaster copies of the sections removed by Elgin. The effect is awe-inspiring. For the first time, visitors can see for themselves the travesty of splitting the marbles.
“It’s clearly ridiculous if you have a body in London and a head in Athens to keep them separate,” said Pandermalis. “Reunification is not just an emotional issue, it is a logical one. It’s a basic principle of archeology.”
With 2m people expected to visit the museum each year, the Greeks hope that public opinion will slowly force a change of heart in London. That looks unlikely in the near future.
The official line from Great Russell Street is that the BritishMuseum is a superior home because it provides a “unique overview of world sculpture”.
After a recent visit to Athens, Dr Andrew Burnett, deputy director of the BritishMuseum, said he was “very impressed”. So does the new building move the argument forward? “No,” said Burnett. “There is no proposition on the table [to return the marbles to Greece], so the subject has not been discussed by the trustees.”
Whatever the arguments, when you stand in that gallery, looking at the missing sections and gazing across to the Parthenon, it is hard not to feel an emotional tug. It may have been 30 years in the making, but this museum has been worth the wait.
This unusual town is located on Mokra Gora, in western Serbia, between mountains Zlatibor and Tara. It consists of wooden houses, precisely log huts, which preserved the authentic of this part of Serbia. Some of these log huts were carried from neighboring villages, which gives to Mecavnik a special charm, as they are named after the owners, like Vitorova house, Ostojica house…All these houses attracts with own exterior, but the interior also offers a feeling of warmth, because you can feel the love and attention invested in interior. It’s enough to know that all furniture in log huts is handmade, carved and imaginative illustrated, with decorative needle worked curtains on small windows. All rooms has bathroom, plasma TV, telephone. Part of Mecavnik is also a church, restaurant, souvenir shop, gallery, cinema Underground, national restaurant, weave workshop, and many other things that makes your stay in this really special place unforgettable. Streets in this town are named after famous persons from culture, science, sport, such as the main street of Ivo Andric, street of Ernest Ce Gevara, Diego
Maradona, Miodrag Petrovic Ckalja – famous Serbian actor, Felini, Bergman. Soon, one street will be named after Novak Djokovic. Together with famous train Cira and Sargan Eight, this is one of the most attractive tourist destinations of Serbia. Events: Serbia’s best known director Emir Nemanja Kusturica talks about the second year of Kustendorf film and music festival
The Very Best from the World of Film
Right after Eastern Orthodox Serbs end the fast and celebrate Christmas according to the Church calendar, a small ethno village built on the slopes of breathtaking hills in central Serbia by the legendary director Emir Nemanja Kusturica — Drvengrad — will once again turn into a place of living magic by the worldwide film artists, such as American independent director Jim Jarmusch, an honorary guest of the second Kustendorf Festival, who will get his own street as four of his movies (1984 Stranger Than Paradise, 1986 Down by Law, 1995 Dead Man and Broken Flowers from 2005) get presented within the Festival’s Retrospective of Greatness. Chock-full of exquisite treats even for the most refined palates of avid film connoisseurs and brimming with creative energy, Kustendorf 2009 will offer free screenings in three theaters with the best equipment in the world, workshops galore, competition program of the works by the film students from 16 countries, and a rare opportunity to meet the coolest moving-pictures’ artists like Jim Jarmusch, Oliver Stone, Alain Delon or the famed Chinese master-directorZhang Yimou. Serbia’s best known director, Kustendorf’s founder, manager and movie selector Emir Nemanja Kusturica is ending preparations for the second edition of his festival, which will be held from January 8-14, 2009. Kusturica declared his village Drvengrad on the slopes of Mećavnik hill “a mythical place of film authors” and invited his old friend, American cult filmmaker Jim Jarmusch as a central guest of this year’s Festival. Festival Based on Young Filmmakers’ Interaction with the Film Greats The basis of Kustendorf Festival, sponsored by the Serbian Ministry of Culture, is the young filmmakers’ encounter and interaction with the film greats. For the competitive program Kusturica selected 35 films this year, works of film academy students from 16 countries: Cuba, CzechRepublic, Egypt, Georgia, Germany, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Poland, Scotland, Serbia, Slovakia,Spain, Turkey, United Kingdom and USA. To the young authors who compete for Gold, Silver, and Bronze Egg, Kusturica will show films which in his opinion marked the past movie season. The authors of these films, directors, screenplay writers and the actors will run workshops for the students. This year’s president of the jury will be Serbian actress Anica Dobra.
Kusturica selected two movies for the Evergreen part of the Festival, Mikhail Kalatozov’s I Am Cuba, from 1964, and Péter Gothár’s Time Stands Still, from 1982.
Hungarian director Gothár will also be among the Festival guests and, after the projection of his film on January 10, he will hold the workshop for the film students taking part in Kusterndorf’s Competition Program.
Time Stands Still is a story about the hard life of the youth in Budapest at the beginning of the 1960s. At the center of the story are two brothers whose father fled during the Hungarian uprising in 1956, to avoid going to prison, while mother stayed with the sons. A father’s friend manages to escape from prison and moves in with them, which makes the boys unhappy.
Film I Am Cuba, a Russo-Cuban co-production, represents an unusual homage to Fidel Castro’s revolution. The story takes place during the last days of Batista’s regime, and it consists of four poetic shorts about the Cuban sufferings and their reactions, up to the guerrilla march.
A cooperation between the Russian “Mosfilm” and the Cuban ‘ISAIS” was a sign of solidarity at the start of the Cuban crisis. The film was completely forgotten until it was rediscovered 30 years later in United States by Martin Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola. The film was restored under their supervision.
Another exclusive projection announced is Oliver Stone’s film “W”, about George W. Bush.
Each day at midnight, after the movie projections and workshops, music gigs and concerts are planned in which the international and domestic bends will compete, including Kusturica’s own “No smoking orchestra”.
Perhaps an Exhumation This Year…
Kusturica imposed the most demanding schedule upon himself, committing to run the film school every day in the morning hours, where the focus will be placed on contemporary trends in the film world, the influence French poetic realism and the Italian neo-realism have upon the contemporary film language, the screenplays, work with actors and camera (dedicated to his associate who recently passed away, Vilko Filač).
“Maradona watched himself in Cannes, he enjoyed, laughed, and said that no other film about him is valid any longer, other than this one. Unfortunately, Maradona will not be at this year’s Festival. Since he won the battle with drugs, he has now returned to sport. He became the coach of a national football team, and in Argentina that is more than being president of the state. We’ll bring him over when he achieves a great victory,” Kusturica said.
After ritually burying Hollywood hit movie “Die Hard” at the last year’s festival, Kusturica said he will not hold the same type of performance this year. Instead, he said he is thinking about an exhumation this time around, although he wouldn’t reveal any details. He did announce opening of the Jim Jarmusch Street in Drvengrad and the next year Festival’s main guest of honor, Johnny Depp.
Kustendorf is a Very Different Film Festival
According to Kusturica, there are more film authors today than before, but in the world dominated by the market they are marginalized, invisible. Therefore, his Festival is “attempting to act opposite to the market laws and the idea of liberal capitalism, which is based on quantity”, Kusturica explained.
“Today, when the festivals struggle to show as many movies as possible, we have selected only seven films for the program Contemporary Authors’ Tendencies — those which clearly stood out in the last year’s production by their quality. In that sense, Kustendorf is indeed an elitist place. And living in the village today is a great privilege. On the other hand, we did not turn our backs to democracy either, so we organized free transportation twice a day from the nearby towns for the Festival screenings. Movies on Kustendorf Festival are shown in three movie theaters with the best equipment in the world. Neither films nor music are being charged for,” Kusturica told Belgrade media.
He announced making of his new movie “Pancho Villa” for the end of 2009, to be filmed in Mexico and Spain. Scenario for this film, written by the Serbian screenwriter Gordan Mihić, will be finished on January 15.
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